SEOUL (Reuters) - South Korea's foreign exchange authorities have been engaged in a quiet war in recent months to hold down the won, throwing more firepower at it than for years in a bid to support exports and help keep the economy on its fragile recovery track. The dollar-buying accelerated as the won hit six-year highs and crept toward 1,000 to the dollar, a psychologically symbolic level that policymakers appear reluctant to see broken quickly. It stood at around...

CAIRO, April 16 (Reuters) - Negotiations between Egypt and an International Monetary Fund mission ended without agreement on a proposed $4.8 billion euro loan to help tackle a severe economic crisis, but an IMF statement cited progress and said talks would continue. "The mission made progress in the discussions with the Egyptian authorities on their economic programme and possible financial support from the IMF," a statement issued early on Tuesday after 12...

(Reuters) - Standard & Poor's revised its outlook on Ukraine to stable from negative, saying that the International Monetary Fund program adopted in April has helped improve the economic situation in the country. However, the agency noted that the IMF program could be impacted by geopolitical risks and a severe recession. "Full disbursement of the International Monetary Fund program and related multilateral lending should enable Ukraine to meet its external...

WASHINGTON (Reuters) - The International Monetary Fund said on Friday that bank reforms being put in place by Spain were an 'effective response' to financial sector vulnerabilities. "We endorse the authorities' approach of significantly raising provisions as a cushion against potential future losses, of providing a government backstop to those institutions that may need additional time, of restructuring and resolving the banks with state participation, and of implementing an independent...

KIEV (Reuters) - Ukraine expects to receive a second tranche of $1.5 billion from an International Monetary Fund's $17 billion aid package, Prime Minister Arseny Yatseniuk said on Wednesday. Yatseniuk said he was expecting to meet later on Wednesday a visiting IMF mission that has been examining Ukraine's economic performance since June 24. "We believe Ukraine has fulfilled the criteria which are written into our IMF program and we should complete discussions...

WASHINGTON (Reuters) - The International Monetary Fund welcomed China's move on Saturday to double the size of its trading band against the dollar, and said it would help the country rebalance its economy. "I would like to welcome this important step by the People's Bank of China to increase the flexibility of their currency," IMF managing director Christine Lagarde said in a statement. "This underlines China's commitment to rebalance its economy toward domestic consumption and...

BRUSSELS (Reuters) - Ukraine's deputy prime minister told international donors on Tuesday that a $17 billion International Monetary Fund bailout was "not enough" because of "unprecedented Russian-inspired aggression". Vice Prime Minister Volodymyr Groysman urged international donors at a meeting in Brussels to support a "Marshall Plan" for economic recovery that the government will present at a donors' conference expected to be held in the autumn. The IMF approved a $17...

ATHENS (Reuters) - Greece needs to improve the efficiency of its public sector dramatically to meet fiscal targets and avoid new austerity measures, the International Monetary Fund said on Tuesday. It cautioned that reform fatigue had set in among the ruling coalition. "Adjustment fatigue has set in and the coalition government has a reduced majority of just two seats in the 300-member parliament," the IMF said in its latest review of Greece's progress under its...

WASHINGTON, March 14 (Reuters) - The Palestinian Authority's fiscal situation is "increasingly precarious," the International Monetary Fund warned on Thursday. The IMF called for urgent action to help it close a gaping budget deficit and to stabilize the economy. In a report prepared ahead of a donor meeting in Brussels on March 19, the IMF said the Authority, which exercises limited self rule in the occupied West Bank, faced mounting debt on domestic...

BEIJING (Reuters) - The International Monetary Fund (IMF) recommended that China adopt an economic growth target of about 7 percent for 2015 and urged authorities to avoid further stimulus measures and concentrate on curtailing financial risks instead. In remarks that projected confidence about the near-term health of the world's second-biggest economy, the IMF said Beijing must keep its word on implementing reforms that will correct imbalances, including a...

(Reuters) - The International Monetary Fund must not always be led by a European and could one day move its headquarters to Beijing from Washington, the French head of the international financial institution said on Friday. "I don't think it's ... fate that the IMF will be managed by a European," Christine Lagarde, the Fund's managing director, said at the London School of Economics. "I think it's a good thing that it's managed by a woman for the first time," she added,...

WASHINGTON, July 18 (Reuters) - The International Monetary Fund on Wednesday approved changes to its rules on monitoring the world's economies, which now make it mandatory for the IMF to assess whether one country's policies are negatively influencing the international monetary system. Until now, IMF assessments of economic spillovers was voluntary but the recent financial crisis showed that the policies of one country can easily impact others. "While oversight of...

By David Milliken LONDON (Reuters) - The International Monetary Fund urged Britain to rein in risky mortgages to cool the housing market, the strongest warning yet from an international organization about the risk of a property price bubble. The IMF said in its annual report on the country's economy published on Friday that so far there were few signs of a credit-driven bubble in British house prices. But that could change fast and lenders should stop letting so many...

As the Asian financial crisis continues to unfold, both in the streets of Jakarta and the halls of Congress, larger questions are being asked about how the world should deal with future financial firestorms. Asia is the current hot spot; it won't be the last. Long after Asia has cooled and Congress has voted up or down $18 billion in new lending authority for the International Monetary Fund, there will be financial crises and the need for solutions. The emergence of global capital markets...

By Tetsushi Kajimoto and Leika Kihara TOKYO (Reuters) - Japan's consumer spending and production slumped more than expected in response to last month's sales tax increase, raising questions about the pace of economic recovery and highlighting the need for reforms to sustain growth once the tax shock fades. The International Monetary Fund expressed its confidence on Friday that the world's third-largest economy will pick up again in the second half of the year....

By Tetsushi Kajimoto TOKYO (Reuters) - A senior International Monetary Fund official said on Friday that the yen is broadly in line with Japan's medium-term fundamentals, and urged the country to focus on efforts to improve its competitiveness and growth potential. David Lipton, the first deputy managing director of the IMF, told Reuters in an interview that the Fund's main concern is whether Japan could forcefully implement structural reforms to shore up its sliding...